A symposium in South Korea centered on the life and works of Cardinal Stephan Kim Sou-hwan, the country’s first cardinal, as part of the preparation for his sainthood.
Seoul’s Diocesan Committee for Beatification and the Korea Institute of Church History co-hosted the event on February 8.
Msgr. Bogusław Turek, Assistant Secretary of State for Canonization of the Holy See, delivered the keynote lecture.
He praised South Korea’s vigor in promoting people of Korean origin to be included in the rank of Catholic saints. "The saints, the blessed, and the servants of God are the great heritage of the civil community," he said.
"May their testimony always be abundant and bear abundant fruit of grace and faith, and may their spirit continue to renew the face of this blessed land of Korea."
Moreover, Msgr. Turek revealed that the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea is the petitioner on six of the seven causes for sainthood currently being processed in the Vatican.
Father Ko Jun-seok, Pastor of Hyehwa-dong Parish in the Archdiocese of Seoul, and Father Jae-don Lee, the archdiocese’s director of the Institute of Ecology and Spirituality, also spoke at the event about the legacy of Cardinal Kim.
This symposium is the second in the series of lectures, serving as a follow-up to the first one held on January 11.
In July 2024, the Archdiocese of Seoul confirmed that the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints approved the beatification and canonization process of Cardinal Kim, who is now called a Servant of God.
Aside from being Korea’s first cardinal, he was also the eleventh archbishop of the archdiocese. The cardinal was prominent for being “a friend of the poor and marginalized” and was a staunch human rights and democracy advocate when the country was under military dictatorship.
During Pope Francis’ visit to South Korea in 2014, he beatified 124 martyrs, including Paul Yun Ji-chung and James Kwong Sang-yon.
As of 2017, a total of 213 Korean priests and laity, most of them martyrs, are in line to be advanced to the sainthood process.
Radio Veritas Asia (RVA), a media platform of the Catholic Church, aims to share Christ. RVA started in 1969 as a continental Catholic radio station to serve Asian countries in their respective local language, thus earning the tag “the Voice of Asian Christianity.” Responding to the emerging context, RVA embraced media platforms to connect with the global Asian audience via its 21 language websites and various social media platforms.
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